By Jim Goodridge – former California State Climatologist
Photosynthesis simply stated is 6CO2 + 6H2O + photons = C6H12O6+6O2.
It is suggested by the relative abundances of atmospheric CO2 and O2,
That CO2 is a quite active material and it is always in short supply.
Plant growth is basically the chemical reaction of storing solar energy.
Chemical reactions generally double with an increase of 10°F.
Rising temperatures cause CO2 to boil out of ocean water.
Rising temperature and CO2 concentration both stimulate plant growth.
Our atmosphere originally contained about 30 percent CO2.
The era of chlorophyll dominance is referred to as the Great Oxidation.
This happened 2.5 billion years ago. The ocean’s dissolved iron.
Rusted out, producing our planets iron ore deposits and releasing oxygen.
Chlorophyll is still the mechanism controlling the CO2 and O2 abundance.
All life forms basically originated by a photosynthesis process.
Chemically our hemoglobin and chlorophyll are quite similar.
Suggesting a common origin, that is supported by common DNA code.
Where as animals do not photosynthesize, their plant foods do.
Beef, chicken or fish feed off photosynthetic products.
It is mainly trace minerals that supplement photo-source.
CO2 is literally the gas of life for all macro life forms we encounter.
The existence of extremophiles suggests very early non-solar energy sources.
Demonizing CO2 started with the plan for peaceful use of atomic bombs.
The big dream in 1946 that was that atomic energy would be so cheap,
That electricity would never again need to be metered.
The attribution of increased CO2 to fossil fuel burning was born here.
Atomic energy advocates wanted to save Earth from runaway GH heating like Venus.
A conservation ethic developed to conserve the finite petroleum for the future and
Anti-pollution and anti-growth advocates added voices to the anti- CO2 theme.
All earthly macro life forms are photosynthically derived from CO2,
Either directly or indirectly by chlorophyll that absorbs solar photons.
We are not here not at the whim of a deity but by evolution of CO2 derivatives.
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Note: Jim’s line, The attribution of increased CO2 to fossil fuel burning was born here.
There’s a tremendous backstory to this which I have been chasing for awhile. See this post from the earlier days of WUWT in 2008. If anyone can help find it, I’d be appreciative.
“interesting… verified it at Leif’s site… 10.7 polynomial trend going down…
http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-SORCE-Latest.png”
umm, sorry, but anyone who thinks that anything in nature follows a polynomial curve, needs to go back to secondary school. Just like anyone who thinks linear trends are the go.
Maybe for short-term data, you might be able to fit either to a set, but the result is meaningless, and serves no purpose.
AndyG55 says:
March 1, 2012 at 3:47 am
Maybe for short-term data, you might be able to fit either to a set, but the result is meaningless, and serves no purpose.
The polynomial fits are only for ‘entertainment’ or indicating the short-term behavior. In weak cycles solar activity goes up and down repeatedly, compare http://www.leif.org/research/SC14-and-24.png so expect activity to go up again, then down, then up, etc. for several years to come.
Jim Goodridge,
While I liked your essay it does contain a “Schoolboy Howler”:
“This happened 2.5 billion years ago. The ocean’s dissolved iron.
Rusted out, producing our planets iron ore deposits and releasing oxygen.”
Actually, the iron deposits were created by the oxidation of iron dissolved in the oceans. Until the Iron had precipitated out the oxygen content of the atmosphere was depressed. Once dissolved iron was reduced to traces, oxygen could build up in the atmosphere thanks to primitive life forms.
I am sure the carbon cycle used to be in the grade 10 curriculum, if you study the carbon cycle and the Krebb’s cycle and still think of C02 as a pollutant, you fail.
The author is assuming the reader has basic understanding of chemistry and skips over some details.
See if this makes more sense to you:
About 2.5 billion years ago the development of photosynthesis changed our planet’s chemistry. Prior to that time, our atmosphere was rich in CO2 and almost devoid of free oxygen. Once photosynthesis developed, it changed this chemical composition over time by releasing free oxygen and consuming CO2 as it formed complex molecules rich in carbon. The atmospheric concentration of CO2 began to drop while the free Oxygen released was used up almost as fast as it was created by binding to minerals that were prone to oxidation such as iron dissolved in the oceans. Once most of the minerals that were reactive to oxygen were converted to their oxides, and precipitated out of the ocean, the oxygen was free to began accumulating in the atmosphere.
This opened the door for the development of organisms that used oxygen.
At first the free iron and other dissolved metals in the ocean, which actively combined with oxygen, were an oxygen sink (consumed any free oxygen released by photosynthesis). Only after they were mostly converted to their oxides did oxygen accumulate in any significant quantity.
Larry
Clandestine horticulturists have known for a long time that dumping some CO2 into ones grow room greatly increases yield.
Thanks Larry, but it’s not what I was after.
The Goodridge piece is a concise summation of carbon’s place in “life on Earth”, for want of a better term.
Composed of short sentences with an absence of qualifying clauses, it sets out carbon’s role in an easy-to-follow manner that imposes no strain on the brain for those of us who are more at home in the world of dreamers than the world of doers.
Or it would have been if the typographical gremlins hadn’t got in and buggered it up — every line starting with a capital letter, every line bar three ending with a full stop . . . what’s with that? It looks like it’s been pushed through some sort of “turn your prose into poetry” program.
I correspond from time to time with a prominent Australian newspaper columnist. He admits he knows nothing of science but backs the warmists because “I trust the guys who study this subject every day of their working lives”. Obviously, he’s not writing a science column but every often he will chuck into his column a dig at climate deniers. One of his latest was a claim that CO2 was poison.
For a while now I’ve been looking for something to cut and paste and sent to him. It has to be from a respected name (to counter his “guys who study this subject every day of their working lives” line) and it has to be set out in a manner that a 12-year-old of normal intelligence could follow.
Goodridge’s piece would have fitted the bill perfectly. Except that, were I to send it as is, a reply would come flying straight back, “You expect me to believe this. The guy can’t punctuate, can’t construct a sentence, and you reckon he’s got all the answers. I can’t make head nor tail of it.”
So, what I wanted was not a long-winded replacement.
What I wanted was Goodridge’s original words with all the dopey punctuation and capitalisation taken out.
But thanks for the effort.
@ur momisugly Leif Svalgaard
“The polynomial fits are only for ‘entertainment’ …..
Then why bother with them. ???? They make you look stupid.. which I know you are not.
Please don’t become another Al Gore or AGW apologist, purely for entertainment.
Stick to the science, and don’t try to add these “lowest commom denominator” touches.
@Leif Svalgaard
Sorry, a bit grumpy this morning… but the fitting of irrelevant curves to data really gets my hackles raised.
Thank you very much Dr. Goodridge, Anthony.
After some editorial work I have published this article at http://www.oarval.org/ClimateChangeBW.htm#Goodridge
This had to be said; CO2 is the gas of life.
AndyG55 says:
March 1, 2012 at 2:41 pm
Sorry, a bit grumpy this morning… but the fitting of irrelevant curves to data really gets my hackles raised.
A fit for short-term estimate is quite legit as the Sun operates in ‘episodes’ of ~0.5-1.5 year duration so there is some merit to a short-term fit as there is persistence on that time scale, as long as one does not take it too seriously. I find the fits useful. What does that make me? Stupid? So be it. For example, I’ll predict that the sunspot number tomorrow will not be 200. Any wagers? I’ll pay 20 to 1.
re: Andres Valencia at 2:41
You have significantly revised Goodridge’s text and formatting. Regardless of which version is better, yours or his (and each has its good points and bad points), I think you have overstepped by stating on your web page that your version is
“By Dr. Jim Goodridge – former California State Climatologist.”
Of course, you must give credit; I suggest “inspired by” or “de-poeticized” or something. Even “paraphrased” is too minor — you’ve done more than that.
Leif Svalgaard says:
March 1, 2012 at 6:46 am
“The polynomial fits are only for ‘entertainment’ or indicating the short-term behavior. In weak cycles solar activity goes up and down repeatedly, compare http://www.leif.org/research/SC14-and-24.png so expect activity to go up again, then down, then up, etc. for several years to come.”
================
Said weak cycle activity: having no bearing on cloud cover , or type of clouds, or height of clouds, or position of jet streams.
Or would it be improbable.
u.k.(us) says:
March 1, 2012 at 5:05 pm
Said weak cycle activity: having no bearing on cloud cover , or type of clouds, or height of clouds, or position of jet streams. Or would it be improbable.
there are many claims both pro and con. Since activity is now what it was a century ago one could ask if you think the climate now is also the same as back then? Faced with this question, enthusiasts bring in arguments like: the deep ocean has a long time constant, thee is a large lag between cause and effect, other factors [volcanoes, AGW, land use, etc] play a role, etc.
NeedleFactory,
Please point out the bad points in my editorial work.
Leif Svalgaard says:
March 1, 2012 at 5:46 pm
“Faced with this question, enthusiasts bring in arguments like: the deep ocean has a long time constant, thee is a large lag between cause and effect, other factors [volcanoes, AGW, land use, etc] play a role, etc.”
==========
Do they not play a role ?
Does our variable heat source not play a role ?
Could random releases of energy combine to produce higher peaks/or lack thereof lower lows than our crude (100 years hence, laughable) science had foreseen.
u.k.(us) says:
March 1, 2012 at 7:08 pm
Does our variable heat source not play a role ?
Of course it does, but it is tiny.
Leif Svalgaard says:
March 1, 2012 at 7:56 pm
“Of course it does, but it is tiny.”
========
What causes sun spots, and why do they seem to be rather cyclic.
RobRoy says:
March 1, 2012 at 12:46 pm
Clandestine horticulturists have known for a long time that dumping some CO2 into ones grow room greatly increases yield.
Thats why Shell Netherlands (big oil) pumps that stuff through a pipeline towards the greenhouse farmers in the Westland area just north of the Europort area. That with a lot of watering and assimilation lighting with either mercury-, sodium- or natrium-vapor lamps and you have the key for one of the smallest countries in the world being the third largest exporter of veggies and fruits.
One of the problems they have to tackle though is light-polution, the newest set of regulations state that 98% of the light is not allowed to escape from the greenhouses in 2018.
Thats why Led-lighting is the newest thing in providing the plants with photons (wich is also known as PAR), it uses less electricty and produces less heat and last longer (up to 5 times longer compared to tradional lighting), the disadvantage though is they are are not as efficient for photosynthesis as high pressure sodium vapour lamps wich still wich rules as being the most effective lighting,
If they can increase the PAR per Watt than led-lights will be the lightsource of the future. PAR means “Photosynthetically Active Radiation”, its the difference between energy used and energy produced by the lamp at right wavelenghts. A typical HPS lamp produces about 32 watts of light for every 100 watts its uses.
NeedleFactory says:
March 1, 2012 at 4:55 pm
re: Andres Valencia at 2:41
You have significantly revised Goodridge’s text and formatting. Regardless of which version is better, yours or his (and each has its good points and bad points), I think you have overstepped by stating on your web page that your version is
“By Dr. Jim Goodridge – former California State Climatologist.”
Of course, you must give credit; I suggest “inspired by” or “de-poeticized” or something. Even “paraphrased” is too minor — you’ve done more than that.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Exactly what were the “good points” with Goodridge’s formatting? The punctuation? The capitalisation? What?
From what I can see, Andres Valencia has done an excellent job . . . precisely what I’d been seeking and I thank him for it.
u.k.(us) says:
March 1, 2012 at 8:43 pm
What causes sun spots, and why do they seem to be rather cyclic.
http://solarphysics.livingreviews.org/Articles/lrsp-2011-3/
http://solarphysics.livingreviews.org/Articles/lrsp-2010-3/
Just one comment about iron, oxygen, carbon dioxide etc. etc.
The implication has been made that the carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere was reduced as a result of photosynthesis. If this were correct, atmospheric CO2 could be reduced by growing more plants. It is – but only for a short while until the chemicals (such as sugars) in plant and animal material breaks down to produce CO2 (partly via methane which in turn is oxidised by atmospheric oxygen to CO2). Burying “crops” of trees in old coal mines will only delay the “evil” day.
Large scale reduction in CO2 requires a different process. The carbon cycle has such a process. On the long term rock silicates are weathered by reacting with CO2 to produce calcium and magnesium carbonates (limestone and dolomite) which can then be re-incorporated into the rock cycle. The overall effect is that CO2 is taken “out of circulation” and only returns over huge time periods (multiple millions of years) when the carbonate rocks are subducted by plate tectonics and the CO2 (eventually) returns to the atmosphere via volcanoes.
The effect will be greatest when mountains are present. The early Earth had few, if any, mountains because the surface was so hot and plate tectonics had not started.
The large scale and long term reduction in CO2 appears, therefore, to be geological, not biochemical.
Try Googling carbon dioxide and the rock cycle (or just rock cycle) for more info.
Andres Valencia asked of NeedleFactory: Please point out the bad points in my editorial work.
For better or worse, you lost the visual poetry of the original. Many will prefer your version, but mere popularity does not bestow the right to claim your version (with augmentation and style change) is “by” the original author. Goodridge’s words were source and inspiration for your version, and he must be acknowledged, but your attribution puts your words into his mouth. My (and others’) appreciation of your version is beside the point.
The salient “bad point” in your editorial work is the phrase “By Dr. Jim Goodridge”.
Thanks NeedleFactory, I see [your] point.
I have added “[edited by Andrés Valencia]”.
There is also a Spanish translation at http://www.oarval.org/CambioClimaBW.htm#Goodridge
“El Gas de la Vida”.